[lg policy] Taiwan: "Being International Society" - Two Language Centers in NCKU are Inaugurated with Excitement

Sat Sep 19 15:03:35 UTC 2009

"Being International Society" - Two Language Centers in NCKU are
Inaugurated with Excitement on Sept. 17

Fri Sep 18, 2009 7:33am EDT

 TAINAN, Taiwan--(Business Wire)--

Each language is like a window, and every window shares different experiences,
feelings, knowledge, arts and cultures with all citizens around the world.
National Cheng Kung University had an inauguration ceremony for both the NCKU
Chinese Language Center and the NCKU Foreign Language Center together on Sep
17th to bring the world into NCKU and to publicize NCKU to the world with a hope
to build up the best language learning platform around the world. Not only many
invited esteemed guests attended, but also the band "ANDES" formed by a group of
international students performed with South-American music.

The Chinese Language Center and Foreign Language Center together were formally
opened at 12 noon, Sep 17th on the entrance hall of Hsiu-Chi Building, Kuang-Fu
Campus, and attended by Prof. Ming-Jer Tang as the Vice President of Academic
Affairs, Prof. Hwa Dai as the Chair of Research Center for Humanities and Social
Sciences, Prof. Chang-Min Chen as the Dean of College of Liberal Art, Prof.
Wen-Jen Hsieh as the Director of NCKU Library, Prof. Andy Y. G. Fuh as the Dean
of College of Sciences, Prof. Rong-Fu Wu as the Director of the NCKU Chinese
Language Center, and Prof. Chung-Hsiung Lai as the Director of the NCKU Foreign
Language Center.

Prof. Ming-Jer Tang commented that NCKU has contributed much effort and
resources to promote humanistic education and to enhance internationalization of
NCKU. NCKU has emphasized much on Chinese language education for a long while,
and, in addition to providing the needed resources for the NCKU Landmark
Projects in Humanities and Social Science, has given full support in workforce,
such as qualified lecturers, and grant supports to Chinese Language Center and
Department of Chinese Literature in research and development in Chinese reading
and writing. Now these two centers, originally under the Language Center of the
College of Liberal Art, both have been promoted to those directly under the
administration of college. Hence, both centers are expected to have more
responsibility in linguistic education. Both centers should work closely
together to make the best education in Chinese and foreign languages, and even
more, to become the world center of language education.

Prof. Chang-Min Chen as the Dean of College of Liberal Art appreciated full
support and assistance from Academician Michael Ming-Chiao Lai as the NCKU
President, and Prof. Ming-Jer Tang as the Vice President of Academic Affairs.
Prof. Chang-Min Chen mentioned that both NCKU Chinese Language Center and
Foreign Language Center have solid background and abundant resources, especially
in teachers, supporting staffs and facility, and, hence, have delivered
plentiful teaching outcomes and achievements. These excellent achievements of
both centers have attracted hundreds of students to NCKU to pick up their
proficiency every year. He also commented that internationalization in the NCKU
College of Liberal Arts has been somewhat realized, so that hundreds of
international students could be encountered in the faculty hall every day, which
could certainly be regarded as the best stage to show the success of NCKU`s
effort in internationalization. The faculty also looks forward to having more
exchange in different cultures in NCKU to appeal for more exchanges in
humanities, music, and cultures.

More than 100 invited guests and students together participated lively. The
foreign students around the world performed a series of cultural and folk
activities at 11:40am before the inauguration. Prof. Chang-min Chen as Dean of
College of Liberal Art held a welcome party at the meeting room on the seventh
floor of College of Liberal Art, and shared new versions and guidelines as
"Whole Language Policy of NCKU" with all invited guests.

Prof. Rong-Fu Wu, the Director of the NCKU Chinese Language Center, commented
that the predecessor of the Chinese Language Center of the College of Liberal
Arts is "Chinese Language Laboratory Center of the College of Liberal Arts",
which was established in the Fall of 1982. Later, it was replaced as "Chinese
Language Center of the College of Liberal Arts" with expansion of the center. It
has been rated as one of the four main language centers in Taiwan by Ministry of
Education at 2007, and has also been the biggest Chinese Language Center in
Southern Taiwan. One mission of the center is not only to support Chinese
training of foreign talented workers for Taiwanese industry, but also lecturing
more than 600 international students of NCKU in Chinese. There are also lots of
study tours every summer and winter vacation. In the future, Chinese Language
Center will comply with NCKU`s policy in internationalization to attract more
foreign people learning Chinese in NCKU, as well as to provide more diverse and
qualified Chinese language courses and materials to overseas partner academic
institutes of NCKU. The center will also make the greatest effort in editing
better and suitable learning materials and audio books, designing a proper
Chinese language proficiency test, and syllabi for interactive distant teaching
courses for all interested in learning Chinese.

Prof. Chung-Hsiung Lai, the Director of the NCKU Foreign Language Center,
indicated that the Foreign Language Center of the College of Liberal Arts
evolved from the "Language Laboratory of the Department of Foreign Languages and
Literature" established in 1970. It was replaced to "Foreign Language Center of
the College of Liberal Arts" in 1983. "There are four divisions of Foreign
Language Center, which are to coordinate English education of NCKU and to
provide an English learning friendly environment, to offer advanced studies of
all kinds of foreign languages, to take charge of English achievement tests
campus-wide and nation-wide, and to offer paper revision service in English,"
said Prof. Chung-Hsiung Lai as Director of Foreign Language Center.
Specifically, the Foreign Language Center is assisting "Eagle Project" to
remodel and revise English courses of NCKU and to provide a comprehensive
English friendly learning environment. Besides that, it provides many advanced
studies for students and community in Southern Taiwan by expanding services of
continuing education to community, and by commencing devised, practical and
novel courses. On the service provided by the center for English reports and
manuscripts, the center aims to become as the "Writing Center" in the future to
provide better service for all teachers and students. At last, the center is
hoping to extend the English test service with close collaboration with
international English test institutions, and looks forward to being the
internationally recognized language training and testing center in Southern
Taiwan.

Some Bolivian students are learning Chinese language in NCKU now and also
attended the inauguration ceremony. They had a band called "ANDES" with Vladimir
Darwin Vasquez Rivera as a singer and guitarist, Jesus Quisbert Menoza playing
"Charango", Juan Carlos Quisbert as a drummer, and Saul Trigueros playing
panpipes. In the opening ceremony of both centers, they performed three melodies
as Mama Sapaqui, Luz Del Ande, and Estas Enmi Corazon to the beautiful and
brilliant homeland and "you are always in my heart" symbolized as Chinese
language center and foreign language center. Their wonderful performance and
resonant singing got warm applause.

About National Cheng Kung University (NCKU), Taiwan:

NCKU is located in the ancient city of Tainan, the historical and ancient
cultural capital city of Taiwan, which boasts more than 50 national relics
sanctioned by the government and is approximately 250 kilometers south of
Taipei. It is connected to all major cities in Taiwan by the recently initiated
state-of-the-art Taiwan High Speed Rail. Further, this historical heritage is
the pride of Tainan City and represents a rich cultural resource to NCKU. The
technological sectors in the Southern Taiwan Science Park offer students at NCKU
a stage to apply what they have learned into practice.

With three quarters of a century of distinguished history, with well over
130,000 powerful alumni now dotting the globe, many have achieved supreme
successes in arts, business, education, science, technology and healthcare and
are ready and willing to assist, with 22,000 academic selective students and
1200 academically significant faculty members currently, both have a healthy
dosage of international flavor, with enormous regional support, and with a
permeating culture of proactive intellectual growth on the world`s stage, NCKU
in Tainan, Taiwan, has evolved from its engineering genesis to become a powerful
comprehensive, research and international university in Asia Pacific.

Since NCKU`s establishment in 1931, it has developed into a research intensive
and comprehensive university with integrated academic fields in nine colleges:
Liberal Arts, Sciences, Engineering, Electrical Engineering & Computer Science,
Planning & Design, Management, Social Sciences, Medicine, and Bioscience &
Biotechnology. NCKU currently offers 40 undergraduate programs (excluding
Program of Bachelor`s Degree), 78 master`s degree programs, 54 doctoral programs
and 20 master`s degree programs for working professionals.

Photos:

http://www.cna.com.tw/postwrite/cvpread.aspx?ID=37918

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